County: Down Site name: Dobbies Garden Centre, Strawberry Hill, Largymore
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: AE/10/041
Author: Sarah Nicol, Northern Archaeological Consultancy Ltd, 638 Springfield Road, Belfast, BT12 7DY.
Site type: Multi-period
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 727654m, N 863448m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 54.503374, -6.029004
Excavations at Strawberry Hill in advance of the construction of a garden centre uncovered an early Neolithic house, middle to late Neolithic pits, a Bronze Age pit, Iron Age ring-ditches and an Early Christian pit.
The early Neolithic house structure measured 5m wide and 7m long with an internal floor space of 32.5m2. It was formed from post- and stake-holes set into a slot-trench, with an entrance facing south-east. The fill of the slot-trench produced quantities of Neolithic pottery and charred grain. The grain was radiocarbon dated and produced a date of 3720–3640 cal. bc.
Located to the north and east of the structure were a series of pits. These pits were dispersed and did not form any pattern. Neolithic pottery was recovered from several of the pits and one of the pits returned a date of 2870–2570 cal. bc.
The only Bronze Age feature on the site was a single pit that had been cut by the later Iron Age barrow. Charcoal from the pit returned a date of 820–760 cal. bc.
The Iron Age was represented on the site by two ring-ditches. Believed to have been barrows, Ring-ditch 1 was 6.3m in diameter and the fill contained large amounts of charcoal and burnt bone, while Ring-ditch 2 was 5.55m in diameter and the fill contained charcoal and less than 1g of burnt bone. Ring-ditch 1 returned dates of 410–360 and 280–260 cal. bc and Ring-ditch 2 returned dates of 360–290 and 240–50 cal. bc.
A single isolated pit with no artefactual material, but with frequent charcoal flecking, returned a date of cal. ad 400–750.
